Flores to Resume Riding Career at Santa Anita

David Flores is expected to resume riding in about 10 days after the California Horse Racing Board granted him a jockey’s license yesterday. The 46-year-old Tijuana native had been disqualified for a year by Singapore racing authorities in late March.

Flores will be represented by agent Jim Pegram. The two have enjoyed much success in the past.

“I’m very happy,” Flores said Friday morning. “Uncle Buck (as Pegram is affectionately known by friends and associates) was the one who gave me a call when I was in Singapore the second day (after he had been given the year’s ban). I was down emotionally and took it as it was, and I’m thinking, ‘a year,’ but when he called me, there was hope.

“That’s what made me take the next step, to come back here and pursue my career again. We’ve got some history together,” Flores said, referring to Pegram, who had his book twice before, from 1993 to 1995 and 1996 into 2004.

During that time Flores and Pegram won two Breeders’ Cup races, the Juvenile on Action This Day in 2003 and the Juvenile Fillies on Tempera in 2001, not to mention the Kentucky Oaks on Keeper Hill for Bobby Frankel in 1998.

“We won about eight $1 million races together,” Pegram recalled, “including the two Breeders’ Cups.”

Flores has more good news pending. He and his wife, Dawn, are expecting their second child, a girl, within the next two weeks.

Source: Santa Anita Park